SunGard launches SOA for energy sector

SunGard has launched Aligne, a service-oriented architecture (SOA) based, straight-through processing solution suite that helps energy companies optimize decision making and quickly adapt to business change by streamlining processes and integrating information across multiple business operations. Energy traders, utilities, midstream gas companies and large industrial consumers of energy can use Aligne to process energy financial and physical transactions across front-, middle- and back-office operations, and utilize configurable components for risk management and compliance.

Inflexible legacy systems, rising costs and inadequate technology infrastructures hinder growth, driving energy companies to seek new technology solutions from fewer vendors. Aligne integrates functional components across SunGard's suite of energy solutions and combines them in an SOA environment with business process management. Aligne gives customers flexibility to choose capabilities specific to business requirements, and includes new deal types, new functional modules, and new data management offerings. Aligne also allows customers to integrate other in-house or vendor applications, and provides an extensible, scalable infrastructure to help sustain business growth in terms of volumes and supported transactions types and commodities.

In addition, companies are under more pressure to address sustainability concerns and initiatives to reduce their carbon footprint through trading and inventory of emissions instruments, managing renewable energy transactions, and optimizing fuel mixes for lower emissions. Aligne helps companies conducting business in physical energy to achieve sustainability, growth and improved control by linking asset management, emissions management, real-time data and trading positions. Aligne provides a data mart, advanced data cubes, library of standard reports, ad hoc reporting tools, and support for dashboards and online analytical processing (OLAP) queries to help customers gain the business intelligence to support commercial decisions. Aligne's real-time alerts, messaging and dashboards help traders and mid-office personnel make informed decisions faster while maintaining the financial precision required for reporting.

Matt Mandalinci, president of SunGard's energy solutions business unit, said, "Streamlining the flow of information can help energy companies make better decisions faster, reduce costs, and achieve greater flexibility and control across the full range of enterprise commercial implications. SunGard's Aligne helps com companies to addresses their functional requirements across the energy transaction value chain using a single vendor; improve the flexibility and extensibility of their systems; and provide access to aggregate information across these systems."

Two customers are already implementing Aligne. One new customer, a major midwest utility, is implementing the full range of trading, risk, gas and power operations, and fuels management functionality for enterprise-wide, straight-through processing. An existing customer in the northwest is currently upgrading its Zainet solution to Aligne, via the addition of the Aligne integration framework, and pre-integrated gas operations components. Aligne's SOA means that existing users of the point solutions can continue to use them standalone or they can choose to gain the benefits of Aligne as they upgrade to the next release of their application.